UT Collections

In 1979, Carla J. Hagen and four other researchers and photographers ‪(‬Dan Dickey, María Flores, Félix Peña, and Scott Van Osdol‪)‬ worked on a project funded by a National Endowment for the Humanities grant and administered through the Southwest Center for Policy Studies in Austin, Texas. They collected 60 songs from migrant workers in the Rio Grande Valley region of Texas, and photographed musicians, informants, and the environment in which migrants live and work.

This collection documents the music and experiences of migrant agricultural workers in the Texas border region. A 403-page manuscript ‪(‬titled La compusimos pizcando: Texas migrant ballads‪)‬ describes the lives and music of Mexican and Mexican American migrant workers and includes an appendix with Spanish language song lyrics and English translations; 7 cassette tapes contain interviews with informants including musical performances; 81 black-and-white photographs by Dan Dickey, María Flores, and Scott Van Osdol show musicians, researchers, and the working and living conditions of migrant workers.

Morris Ernst (1888-1976) was an American lawyer and one of the leading advocates of civil liberties in 20th-century America. Ernst served on President Truman’s Committee on Civil Rights and as counsel to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) (and later director emeritus) where he defended individual rights and freedom in numerous landmark federal cases on privacy, libel, slander, obscenity, censorship, birth control, abortion, and labor issues. However, Ernst also feared communist influence and helped establish a loyalty oath policy within the ACLU. In his lifetime, Ernst worked with controversial figures such as birth control activist Margaret Sanger, Dominican Republic dictator Rafael Trujuillo, and FBI director J. Edgar Hoover.

The career and personal life of Ernst are documented from 1904 to 2000 through correspondence and memoranda; research materials and notes; minutes, reports, briefs, and other legal documents; handwritten and typed manuscripts; galley proofs; clippings; scrapbooks; audio recordings; photographs; and ephemera.

LLEGÓ, the National Latino/a Lesbian and Gay Organization, was founded in 1987 during the National March for Lesbian and Gay Rights in Washington, DC. The organization provided a variety of programs, campaigns and publications to the Latino gay and lesbian community until its close in 2004. LLEGÓ's work focused particularly on local political leadership, national policy work and AIDS awareness. Materials in the collection include administrative and program documents for the organization's 17 years of work.

Anthropologist and novelst, Oliver LaFarge, helped draft a constitution for the Hopi Indians, which he documented in his 116-page manuscript, Running Narrative of the Organization of the Hopi Tribe of Indians (1936). The LaFarge collection contains papers, manuscripts, and correspondence relating to Indian rights and the Hopi Constitution. The collection also includes works of non-fiction, novels and short stories, and the book A Pictorial History of the American Indians.

“Operation Fine Girl: Rape Used As a Weapon of War in Sierra Leone” looks at the widespread and strategic use of rape and sexual violence against women – many of them young girls and teenagers – during the decade-long civil war in Sierra Leone, the world’s poorest country. “Operation Fine Girl” was produced by and for the Oxygen network's Worth The Risk series, in partnership with WITNESS, who put together Binta Mansaray, their local partner in Sierra Leone, and Academy Award-nominated director Lilibet Foster to make the documentary. The collection includes interviews with victims of sexual violence; interviews with medical, legal, and other professionals; footage of political figures; footage of ceremonies, parades, commemoration events, campaign events, and other events; and raw footage of daily life in Sierra Leone. The collection also includes the finished documentary in English and Krio, as well as an excerpted version in English. Materials are in English and Krio.

Aurora Estrada Orozco and her four daughters - María Teresa, Sylvia, Irma, and Cynthia - have been active in the fields of art, politics, journalism, and historical research. The collection contains letters, articles, press releases, clippings, handbills and posters relating to Chicano student activism at the University of Texas and elsewhere, Chicano cultural events in Austin, Texas, feminist issues, and political campaigns. Several issues of Para la gente, and Austin paper edited by Irma which supported the Raza Unida Party, are included.

Roger Casement (1864–1916) was a consular diplomat, tireless campaigner for human rights, and Irish nationalist who was convicted of high treason and hanged in 1916. Although Casement's homosexuality was not an explicit factor during his trial, it was exploited afterward to discourage any case for clemency. The Ottoline Morrell (1873–1938) collection includes drafts of petitions for clemency for Roger Casement and a general account of his activities from 1914 until his arrest, as well as a small amount of correspondence with Casement's cousin, Gertrude Bannister. The Center also has a copy of Queer People (1922), written by Basil Thomson, Assistant Commissioner of Scotland Yard, which includes several pages describing his impressions of Casement during his interrogation on Easter Sunday, 1916.

In 1984 Pan American Films released En nombre del pueblo/In the Name of the People, a documentary of the Salvadoran Revolution. The film was directed by journalist Frank Christopher, produced by Alex Drehsler, and narrated by actor Martin Sheen.

Consists of 59 original photonegatives and corresponding prints showing Mexican American communities in South Texas. The photographs were taken in June, 1941. Images show housing, schools, water supplies, sanitation, and construction techniques in several South Texas counties. Includes pictures of winter housing of migrant agricultural workers, and the small communities of Concepcion, El Sauz, La Grulla, Las Cuevitas, Los Ojuelos, San Ygnacio, and others. The photographs are said to have been taken with a borrowed Kodak as part of a report on conditions in South Texas for the U. S. Department of Agriculture.

The records of PEN International, a writers' organization, consist of letters and documents dating from 1921 to 1972, including correspondence from writer-members, as well as files relating to the organization's political and social activities. The aims of PEN, as outlined on their website, are to promote literature, defend freedom of expression, and develop a community of writers worldwide. To that end PEN "acts as a powerful voice in opposing political censorship and speaking for writers harassed, imprisoned, sometimes murdered for the expression of their views." The 228 boxes of records at the Ransom Center include materials related to Writers in Exile, BLED (an international gathering organized by the Slovene PEN Centre and the Writers for Peace Committee of International PEN), the Fund for Intellectual Freedom, and the London Fund for Exiled Writers.